My Lords, I add my tribute on the impending retirement of the Defence Secretary in the House of Commons. He is the longest-serving Conservative Defence Secretary and, especially in his role in connection with Ukraine, he has been outstanding. We will miss him. I am in many ways sorry that he did not get the job that he aspired to, which I once had the honour of holding. After all, he had the primary qualification that the Minister and I both have—he is Scottish. Sadly, that was not sufficiently appreciated among the other 31 countries and therefore, the Back Benches beckoned to him as well.
The Minister held up the document, and I could see that it has been well flagged by the department for her. It is called not “Refresh” but Defence’s Response to a more Contested and Volatile World. On page 63 it states:
“As set out in the IRR, the most urgent priority in the Euro-Atlantic is to support Ukraine to reassert its sovereignty and deny Russia any strategic benefit from its invasion. Our continued and unwavering support to Ukraine has shown the UK at its best”.
If that is the case and we are now involved in helping Ukraine in the existential battle it is undertaking with the Russian Federation, why is this Parliament debating and discussing this at the fag-end of the day, just before the Summer Recess? Will the Minister reflect on the fact that the last time we had a full-scale debate on the subject of a war in which we are participating was a year ago? Will she take the message back to her department and through it to the Prime Minister that Winston Churchill came to Parliament almost every week during the Second World War in order that the Parliament of the country was as involved in the conflict as Ministers of the Crown? I have made this point to her before, but it needs to go beyond her because I am sure she actually agrees with me. We really have to have proper debates about this matter; otherwise, documents such as this will lie on a shelf and will not help with the campaign or the fight any more than is happening at the moment.